


'cause the truth is

by YourPalYourBuddy



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Baking, Chaptered, Jack's POV, M/M, Snapshots, Social Media, au in which jack isn't well off, i dont know how to bake and neither do they, neither is the hockey team
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-22
Updated: 2020-03-03
Packaged: 2020-09-24 08:22:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 10,610
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20355364
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/YourPalYourBuddy/pseuds/YourPalYourBuddy
Summary: By rights they should be funded to their ears; they made it to the Frozen Four two years in a row. But they’re still having a hard time affording gear, not to mention running the rink. They’ve started taking turns cleaning the ice after practice and mopping the locker rooms to cut down on costs.It hasn’t been enough.______________________An AU in which the Samwell Men's Hockey team is horribly underfunded, to the extent that the team has decided to @ a certain famous baker in the hopes of getting funds. The problem: none of them can bake. The solution: YouTube crash courses, late night strategy meetings, bake offs, and a whole heck of a lot of crossed fingersZimbits, from Jack's POV :)





	1. Chapter 1

________________________

It’s hard to tell whether it’s the overwhelming amount of nakedness or the idea itself that has Jack speechless.

“Sorry — what?”

“Chowder’s idea,” Shitty says. He bounces on Jack’s bed and Jack privately resolves to bleach his whole bedspread. “Like, it was Holster too, he’d hate me if this worked and he got left out of the credit. But mostly C’s.”

Jack delicately drapes his throw blanket over Shitty’s legs. “Chowder wants us to tweet at — at a famous person,” he says slowly, “to see if they’d sponsor us?”

“Yeah, that’s the gist,” Shitty says. He makes grabby hands Jack’s laptop and types furiously into the search bar. “Specifically — here.”

He turns the computer around. 

It’s … it’s a Twitter page showing lot of aesthetic pictures of baked goods, pie tins and flour and shots of pastries rising in a pastel blue oven. Every now and then, short videos of a blond man pop up on the feed advertising his YouTube channel. Shitty clicks on one of the links and before the site changes, Jack sees the man’s Twitter account has 27 million followers. 

And as the YouTube video loads, it doesn’t escape his attention that the man is, without question, gorgeous. 

A prickle of interest curls in his chest. 

“Um,” Jack says brilliantly. “Uh — why him?”

“His name’s Eric Bittle, he’s a professional baker. He used to play coed hockey,” Shitty says, “Rans and Holtzy YouTube spiraled their way throughout his entire channel the other day and he talks about it a lot in his earlier vids.”

They’re quiet long enough for the man to wave and say, “Hey y’all! Gosh, I gotta tell y’all, my aunt and mama aren’t backing down on their jam war, if anyone has ideas to smooth things put ‘em in the comments okay? Now about that lattice work y’all were talking about on that last video, what you’ll wanna do—”

Shitty pauses the video. “It’s gonna be a long shot. But. Jackybabe. You know as much as I do we just don’t have the money without outside help.”

“You’re right,” Jack sighs. “Okay. If you’re sure this is how we have to do it, then let’s go for it.”

A vaguely worrisome grin makes its way over Shitty’s features. “Oh honeybunch, you have no idea how much I’ve wanted you to say that.”

____________

Holster calls a meeting after Shitty texts the green light. Jack and Ransom help him set up powerpoints in the living room as Lardo, Shitty, and the frogs pop enough popcorn for a hockey team six lines deep. 

Their media campaign is simple enough. Rans and Chowder will draft tweets to send twice a week with some video or meme of the team baking their way through Bittle’s cookbook. Jack wants to protest this: they’re all shit bakers, and the kitchen in the Haus a nightmare; Hall and Murray would probably get them in touch with the rink’s concessions staff but budget cuts the year before meant the bare minimum, and then eliminated it all together; no one aside from Lardo knows how to work the camera and edit the footage, and she’s in the thick of her junior year portfolio. He’s on the verge of saying it before Nursey starts debating Holster about the best pie flavors and the meeting sort of implodes from there. He goes into the kitchen to research Bittle’s cookbook, copying and pasting links to recipes they can reasonably hope to accomplish.

“Hey Jack?” Chowder says hesitantly at the kitchen door, after everyone has either gone back to their dorms (Dex, Tango, Wicks) or settled in for another Haus MarioKart tourney (Ransom, Holster, Shitty, Lardo, Nursey, Ollie). “Can I talk to you?”

Jack shuts his laptop and nods and Chowder doesn’t sit down like Jack had expected, opting instead to pace and shake his hands almost unconsciously. He frowns. Chowder doesn’t usually get antsy like this. 

He has a sense Chowder isn’t going to initiate the conversation. He has a sense he really, really needs to know why he’s anxious. “What’s up?”

“Just wanted to — to see if you thought it was a good idea?” Chowder says, and Jack thinks _ oh. _“You didn’t say much and I know there’s downsides to this and I just, I dunno. Wanted your opinion, if you thought it’d work.”

An uncomfortable prickle goes up his spine. He hasn’t gotten used to this yet, his frogs looking to him for advice and validation. You’d think that, in year three of his captaincy, he’d be better at this.

“I’m concerned about the expenses,” Jack says carefully. “Some of these recipes need a lot of time and effort and some of these ingredients are pretty expensive, not to mention the video equipment we might need if we want this to look as professional as we can.” Chowder’s face falls. Jack feels like a massive asshole. “I’m not saying it won’t work, C. I think we need to fine tune it a little, maybe, and see from there.”

Chowder fidgets with his hands, eyes downcast. “It might not work, but — I don’t want them to close us down, we’re playing good hockey.”

That’s the crux of it: Samwell Men’s Hockey isn’t profitable enough to justify keeping the rink as a rink and not turning it into a swimming pool like the athletic board keeps threatening. It’s not fair and they know it, they’ve had winning seasons the last three years Jack’s been part of the team and this year, his senior year, they’re all primed for another sweep of the ECAC. By rights they should be funded to their ears; they made it to the Frozen Four two years in a row. But they’re still having a hard time affording gear, not to mention running the rink. They’ve started taking turns cleaning the ice after practice and mopping the locker rooms to cut down on costs.

It hasn’t been enough.

“We have a chance here,” Jack says after a few moments. It’s as good as saying nothing — his words are still kinda empty, despite how much he wants them to be true — but Chowder perks up, just barely perceptibly. “If you think this could work, I believe you. You’ve got a good head on your shoulders.”

Chowder outright beams at that. It’s a little duller than his usual grin but Jack’ll take it for now. He breathes a little easier, seeing it.

“I won’t let you down, Cap,” Chowder promises, and he leaves Jack to poke through the cookbook alone.

____________

Shitty and Ransom work on an Excel sheet tallying costs in the living room while Jack and Holster stretch on the floor. One of Bittle’s videos plays from the TV. The wood’s cool on Jack’s legs; he wishes he’d taken his parents up when they offered him their old carpet, but at the time it made more sense for it to stay at home. 

He lies down, yawning, and Holster rests his head on Jack’s stomach. Shitty makes a distressed noise and slides off the couch to do the same. Jack bites down a laugh when Shitty demands he play with his hair.

“How’re we looking, Rans?” Holster asks. He claps his hand around Ransom’s leg; Jack doesn’t think he’s imagining the way Holster massages Ransom’s calf, the way there’s a hint of pink creeping into his cheeks. He can’t see Ransom from where he’s lying down, but he’s willing to bet Rans looks equally flustered. Shitty cranes around to look at Jack and they smile while TV Bittle talks about the proper way to knead dough. They’re trying to learn through osmosis. 

Ransom says, “We could like. Actually pull this off.” Jack hears some typing noises, and then Rans adds, “We need at few ten K to be comfortable, and even if Bittle doesn’t decide to help us out, it’s still getting our name out there. Could do some bake sales, a GoFundMe, maybe a fundraiser at the end of the year athletics banquet.”

“Lotta moolah to be made off memes,” Shitty says. He pokes Jack until Jack scratches his head again; sometimes Shitty reminds him of a cat. He scratches Holster’s before Holster can complain. 

“Plus show off our hot bods if we do a car wash,” Holster says sleepily. It’s a wonder he’s able to fall asleep on the floor and not a wonder at once. Jack vividly remembers Holster falling asleep five times during a particularly late practice, once on top of the goal, three times draped over the bench and the boards, and once, on his skates leaning against Lardo while Murray told them the lineup for the next weekend’s game. Hall and Murray hadn’t been too pleased. Jack and the rest of the team would’ve been laughing if it hadn’t been 12 AM. 

Jack says, “Why not just do a strip show,” and all three of them gasp like he’s had a brilliant idea. He backtracks hurriedly, saying, “No, guys, we can’t—” but they’re all talking over each other about their dance songs. 

There’s a good chance they’re joking; he still can’t see Rans but his voice sounds the way it did when they convinced Dex and Nursey the pond was full of turtles and a single manatee earlier in the year, and Shitty’s laughing too hard to make any kind of sense and Holster keeps saying something about Magic Mike the way he does when he _ really _ wants to analyze pop culture. 

“Jack’s is anything by Shania Twain,” Shitty says after a while, gasping. Holster snorts. “Really gets that ass shakin’, huh Jackybear?”

“As if my ass ever quit,” Jack says, and they all burst into laughter again. 

____________

His WGSS120 / HIST376: Women, Food, & American Culture class meets Monday and Wednesday at 9 AM and he really, dearly wishes the first day hadn’t come right after another late practice. 

“Sorry team,” Murray had said in his email. “There’s a travel peewee tourney scheduled today, we’ve got the graveyard shift.” _ The peewee teams bring in money _ goes unspoken. Jack reads it anyway. 

The whiteboard swims before him for the entire hour and a half. It’s just this side of comfortably warm, and Professor Atley has such a soothing voice that Jack nods off through most of her intro speech despite how much he commands himself to stay awake. Her slideshow doesn’t help either; she has photo after photo of delicious-looking food and he keeps drifting off thinking about all the things he wants to eat right now. He missed breakfast. 

“That’s all for today, class,” Atley says eventually, making steady eye contact with everyone in turn. Jack thinks her gaze is mildly reproachful when it meets his, which he sort of understands, his face going bright red. He’d fallen asleep on and off throughout her overview of the jello trend in the 50s. 

The class files out pretty quickly after her dismissal. Jack packs up his notebook and pencils, hesitating; he hadn’t fallen asleep in class since sixth grade, and he kind of wants to apologize. He’s trying to figure out a way to make words make sense in his head despite his lack of sleep when Professor Atley comes up to him first. 

“You’re on the hockey team,” she says. He glances up at her; she’s smiling a little, but there’s a crease between her eyebrows. “Are they working you too hard?”

Jack shakes his head before she finishes her second sentence. “Our coaches are prepping us the best they can, it’s all one foot in front of the other and that’s why we did so well last season.”

Her appraisal of him weighs upon him like it’s a physical thing. He blinks, adjusts his pencil case. 

“Remind me your name,” she says, and he’s so surprised he tells her. “I didn’t mean to imply your coaches are being malicious. Goodness knows I know enough of what’s happening at Faber by now. I meant, you can’t play to your fullest potential when you’re tired, Jack. And nor can you learn to your fullest potential when you’re tired. It’s concerning to see someone like you fatigued already.”

Jack blinks at this. Samwell professors are known for being insightful and concerned for their students, but even so, this is a little too on the nose to just shrug and nod at. 

“How do you — the hockey team, how’d you know—?” 

Something softens around her eyes. “I know your coaches,” she says. “I've heard some about your team’s financial difficulties this season. I assumed.”

“Oh,” Jack says awkwardly. He clears his throat. “It’s been, euh. We’re working on it.”

Atley nods, saying, “Well, let me know if I can help somehow. It’s a shame to put all of this on your team’s shoulders.”

“Thank you,” he says. He shoulders his bag, then pauses. “How’d you know I’m on—?”

“You’re wearing a Samwell Men’s Hockey hoodie,” she interrupts kindly. “It wasn’t hard to put together.”

He says, “Oh,” and she reminds him to look at the slides she posted online and he smiles a thank you on his way out, strangely embarrassed. He really needs to go to sleep. 

________________________


	2. Chapter 2

________________________

“Hey y’all!”

Jack grumbles under his breath, glaring at his door from underneath his pillow. They’ve been at this for almost a week now, and while he understands wanting to get more research in, they’ve been going since 10 PM last night and it’s _ three in the morning. _

It’d be worse if Bittle wasn’t so nice to listen to. If he didn’t clearly know what he was doing in the kitchen. The few videos Jack watched, Bittle spun gracefully among his countertops and deftly measured and whisked and Jack hadn’t thought it was possible to have a thing for the way someone cracks eggs, but. 

He burrows further into his blankets and cuddles his pillow, listening. 

“Today we’re gonna take a look at different kinds of flour, butter, and sugar and what happens when you combine all of them in cookies! I haven’t tried this yet but I’m excited to make a huge mess with y’all today, it’s been a while since I’ve destroyed my kitchen and that’s the joys of experimenting!”

Jack just about tumbles out of bed. That’s it. 

He throws his door open and barrels into Shitty’s room, waving a distracted hand at Lardo and deciding to ignore the fact that they’re both mostly undressed in favor of saying, “This is our first video.”

Shitty says, “Hey Jack,” and Lardo pauses the screen and asks, “What?”

“The whole — the experimenting thing,” Jack says, waving now at the computer. His words feel like peanut butter in his mouth; he tries to swallow around his sleepiness. “It’ll be hilarious, probably. Imagine Rans and Holtzy pulling misshapen cookies out of the oven.”

“Big guys, small cookies,” Lardo says, nodding solemnly like they’ve both collaborated to say something profound. Jack chooses to take this as encouragement. 

He says, “Plus it’d give us a hands on idea of what everything does. All the ingredients he uses.”

“Please tell me you know what butter does,” Shitty says, laughing. Jack rubs the back of his neck. Shitty gestures for him to kneel, then cradles his face in his hands intently. “Oh Jackabee. Too pretty to need to know about butter. You’ll learn.”

Jack mirrors the movement, squishing Shitty’s cheeks. “Thanks for the condescension, Shits.” 

Shirty pats his face apologetically, saying, “You know I don’t mean it,” and Jack’s too excited to keep chirping him about it. He waves him down. 

“It’ll be a mess,” Lardo says, eyes gleaming. It’s the face she makes whenever she needs to spray paint something for class. “You good with that?”

“It’s now or never, right?” Jack says, and then checks his watch. “Euh. Not right now, that is. Tomorrow afternoon it’ll be now or never.”

Shitty and Lardo grin at him like they’re going to go to_ town _ tomorrow in the grocery store. It’d be worrisome, this look of theirs, if he wasn’t very aware that _ they’re _very aware of the budget. Lardo sticks out her fist expectantly. Jack and Shitty bump hers with their own before Jack says good night again and reminds them both about practice and using protection. He gets a mouthful of Shitty’s practice shirt on his way out the door. 

“You’d better hope your cooking tastes better than this does,” Jack chirps, and Shitty narrows his eyes. 

“Big talk, babe,” he says. “Bake off?”

Jack shakes his head. “In your dreams.”

____________

“So,” Holster says through his megaphone. “The rules of this bake off are simple: bake stuff. Make it taste good. And no weed brownies, gentlemen, we’re a family friendly establishment.”

Jack stares down at his ingredients while Holster continues his intro, who was elected judge today because, as he said, “Zimmermann, I love you, but I really can’t pass on watching you and Shits and Chowder making legit fools of yourselves and dragging you all the whole time.”

Jack ties his apron with shaking hands. Realistically he knows his lack of baking skills is not something he needs to stress about — Rans and Lardo talked in an early strategy meeting about how it’s hella funny if they aren’t good at what they’re doing, so if he does as poorly as he’s expecting he will, it’ll be fine — but still. He has an ingrained need to perform well. It’s hard balancing the captaincy with funding problems with school and he’s been managing as well as he can, but that’s all within his comfort zone. He’s been doing all three of these things for years.

This? The kitchen covered in tablecloths, little silver bowls filled with sugar and flour and butter, the oven staring at him from across the room? He’d rather be facing an All-Star lineup playing left handed and short five people.

Okay. Jack has a recipe on the back of a chocolate chip bag for Bittle’s patented cookies propped up in front of his mixing bowl. He fiddles with the corner of the bag now, ignoring Lardo and Dex with their fancy cameras and iPhones, respectively. Lardo winks at him from behind the camera. He makes a face out of instinct, then regrets it. There’s no way they’ll cut that out of the final video.

Deep breaths. He sneaks a peek at Chowder and Shitty, and is calmed somewhat by the fact that neither of them really looks like they know what they’re doing either. Chowder catches him looking and gives him a pair of nervous-looking finger guns. Jack sends some right back.

“Bakers, preheat your ovens,” Holster says in the bullhorn, clearly ignoring the fact that they only have one oven and it’s shit at the best of times. “On your mark, get set, _ bake!” _

Chowder sets off immediately, confidently checking his ingredients and measuring — sugar? It looks like sugar from here, anyway. Jack and Shitty share a look that’s part bewildered, part stupidly impressed.

“Hey, C,” Shitty says, and Chowder glances at him while cracking an egg. “If you want, uh. You can chill the fuck out with your expert baking skills.”

Jack pulls the ‘easy open’ tab on his chocolate chips. It breaks off in his hands. “Thought you’d be better at baking, Shits.”

Shitty brandishes his wooden spoon for emphasis. “I’ll have you know I’m an experienced baker—”

Chowder huffs a laugh. 

“Family friendly,” Holster says loudly, not bothering to hide a shit-eating grin.

“What? I didn’t say anything.”

Smiling, Jack goes back to opening his chocolate chips. There’s a pair of scissors in the kitchen somewhere, but usually all you need to do is pull the sides and — 

And it rips clean open. At least fifteen chips bounce off his face. He instinctively goes to wipe his face with the back of his hand and the rest of the bag spills all over the floor.

He blinks.

“Oh, Jack,” Chowder says, wincing.

Shitty’s laughing so hard he’s in danger of spilling his own ingredients. Jack just stares at the bag in his hand, reading the recipe on the back. _ Two cups chocolate chips, _ it says cheerfully. He’ll be the first to admit he’s no good at baking, but even Jack’s pretty sure you shouldn’t use ingredients if they’ve fallen on the floor. Especially if it’s a floor that’s seen at least five BYOB kegsters in the past three weeks.

“Two cups, huh,” he mumbles. “Merde.”

_ “Language, _ Zimmermann!”

____________

It goes about as well as Jack expected after that. Chowder sweeps it with icing covered blueberry muffins, Shitty whips up a pan of passable brownies — “They’re better with my secret ingredient, Holtzy,” Shitty says. Lardo snorts. — and Jack ends up with a plate of what Holster generously calls “sugar cookies” on camera and off camera refers to as, “the worst thing I’ve eaten, and I say this kindly but literally what the hell happened.” Jack apologizes with a grimace.

“Just chirping,” Holster says later, while they clean up. “You knew that, right?”

Jack scoops up some of his runaway chips. “I got it.”

“Wanted to make sure,” Holster says a beat later. His tone is light in the way it gets when he’s trying to deescalate an awkward situation. 

Jack needs to work on this too. He hadn’t realized he was doing it again. “Sorry,” he says, sighing. He throws his chips away. “I’m not good at—”

“New situations? Being on camera?”

_ Yes_. “Baking,” Jack says.

Holster starts filling the sink with soapy water, eyebrows raised. “That’s part of the point, Zimmermann.”

That needles a little. “I know.”

“I’m not trying to like, explain your emotions and whatever,” Holster says. He starts tackling Shitty’s brownie pan. “This is supposed to be fun, though, so if you’re stressing we can figure something else out.”

It sounds like a genuine offer. Jack takes the pan and dries it and puts it away before he says anything. “I just need practice.”

“Don’t we all,” Holster says. He bumps Jack with his shoulder, face serious. “I mean that, okay? Got your back and all that.”

Jack says, “Thanks,” and bumps him back.

____________

The video goes up while Jack’s in class. Lardo puts a link in the groupchat, and soon his phone’s buzzing so much his professor stops lecture to stare at him. 

“Sorry,” he says, turning his phone on silent. 

Later he slides it out of his backpack to skim some of the texts — there’s a lot of poop emojis, which he thinks are supposed to represent his chocolate chips; he sends back _ Aren’t you guys in class. _ — and taps the link for the tweet. 

**@smhockey - 1 hr ago**

Join us off the ice for a special tean bonding video! Inspired by **@omgcheckplease**’s out-of-this-world YouTube channel. #SamwellMensHockey #SoManyIcingPenaltiesAhead 

He reads the tweet again. Then he opens the groupchat.

**smh groupchat**

_ Jack Zimmermann: _ Tean?

_ Ransom: _???

_ Nursey: _ huh

_ Nursey: _ OH

_ Dex: _ TEAN???

_ Ransom: _ tean bonding haha

_ Lardo: _ shut up you gigantic asshats

____________

The whistle blows again and Jack takes off, pushing himself as hard as he can, and every clean cut of his skates into the ice is such a much-needed release. He hits the blue line and turns sharply, racing back to the goal line.

“Another,” Hall calls, and Murray blows another whistle.

It’s the sound too. Even this late, this tired, Jack can appreciate the noise of twenty-eight players putting everything they have onto the ice. In this moment, he’s so— 

“Another.” Whistle.

Fuck Samwell’s shitty funding, fuck midnight practices, fuck worrying about whether they’ll have money for hotels — looking around at them all while they circle up, everyone flushed and tired and panting and sore, Jack’s so furiously proud of them.

“Hey,” Jack says, grinning. Everyone looks at him, and he tamps down the instinct to say _ what? Oh. Nevermind. _ “It just hit me, we have such a fantastic group of men here and I wanted to say, thank you for sticking around with us. I’m sure each and every one of you would rather be sleeping or at the bars, or anything other than being here at ass o’clock every night, but _ you’re here. _ You’re all putting in the hours. You’re all pushing yourselves. You’re making this team better. I’m going to be—” 

Here Shitty comes crashing in for a hug, and Jack laughs the kind of helpless laugh you make when you’re tired and exhausted and overwhelmed with affection. Shitty knocks their heads together like they’re cellying a goal and that’s all the others need to come piling in too. His heart feels like it’s about to explode. 

“I’m going to be better for you guys this season,” Jack says. Shitty and Chowder make noises like they’re going to contradict him, but he barrels onward. “No, I mean it. I promise I’ll be worthy of you all. Even if it means being an idiot on YouTube.”

His team laughs and holds him tighter and if Jack’s crying a little — if Shitty and Chowder and Ransom and Holster and all his friends are whispering to him under their breath about how they’ve got his back — no one needs to know but him.

____________

The season starts for real in early September with an away series against Rensselaer. Jack, Shitty, Lardo, Ransom, and Holster pile into Jack’s secondhand minivan, all yawning heavily; without talking about it, he pulls into Annie’s drive through and rattles off everyone’s orders by heart. Jack never used to drink coffee, even in the Q, but the late nights and early classes are taking it out of him. 

His friends shuffle around in their pockets and hand him some dollars. There was a time when he would’ve waved them off; sometime before the draft when he would’ve handed over his credit card without even looking at how much it was going to cost him. Now he takes the bills carefully, trying not to look like he’s counting them. 

The barista carefully hands him the drinks and Jack awkwardly passes them to Lardo, who distributes them while he puts the money away. 

“Thanks Jack,” Shitty sings from the back seat. He leans forward and smacks his lips against Jack’s cheek. 

He can see Lardo watching his reaction out of the corner of his eye. She’s making the face she makes when she wants to let Jack know she’s reading his discomfort. He doesn’t say anything, but he rests his hand on the console. She slides her hand in his and squeezes gently. It’s anchoring. He doesn’t really like talking about money.

Jack says, “You each bought your own,” and Shitty readily says, “But you’re driving us.”

He can’t argue with that. 

He eases them onto the highway. 

____________

Lardo wins the AUX somewhere around Waltham after Holster decided to play another TV theme song. Now they’re loudly arguing about the relative merits of various theme songs with expansive hand gestures. Jack keeps having to lean more to the left to keep from being whacked upside the head. He shares a long suffering look with Ransom, who, having taken the middle seat, has been elbowed in the face at least six times already, and they’re still only talking about _ Cheers _ (Holster) and _ The Addams Family _ (Lardo).

“What about John Cena,” Ransom says. 

Out of the corner of his eye, Jack sees Holster freeze in the middle of a particularly large gesture. _ “What?” _

“The song they play when he comes out?” Lardo asks, and Jack’s looking at the road but he can hear her incredulous expression in her voice. “Doesn’t count.”

“It’s technically a theme song, though.” Shitty’s voice is musing. 

Ransom says defensively, “They play it every time, it’s his theme.”

“If it’s a theme for a person, though, does it count?” Jack asks, flicking on his turn signal. “I thought this was just about TV shows.”

“Ex-_ act _-ly,” Holster says, clapping out the syllables. 

“But—”

Lardo reaches back and puts her hand on Shitty’s knee and says, “Look, I love you and everything, but you’re so wrong right now.”

They all hear it at the same time. Lardo makes a noise like a mouse. Jack checks his rearview and smiles to himself at how red Shitty is. Holster and Ransom audibly say something along the lines of _ holy shit is that a fine _ and Jack nudges Lardo with his elbow.

“When’s my next turn, Lards?” Jack asks gently.

She shakes her head like she’s resetting herself and turns back around. “Um. Ten miles.”

“Thanks.”

“Any time,” she mutters, tapping on her phone. 

Seconds later John Cena’s — song? — blasts over the stereo, setting Ransom and Holster off again and Jack and Lardo just look at each other.

“That was a fine distraction,” he says quietly.

“Yee-up.” Lardo looks at him shrewdly. “Don’t remind them.”

He crosses his heart, smiling.

____________

In the hotel, Jack plugs in his headphones and taps over to YouTube. His thumbs pause over a little clip of Eric Bittle smiling up at him, and his stomach swoops stupidly.

Just research, he reminds himself. Whatever feeling he gets from hearing Bittle’s accent or the bowties he puts on sometimes, there’s no point developing a crush on someone he has no chance of meeting. But it’s just research. It’s for the team. And it helps him fall asleep, or so he found out two weeks ago. He has a soothing voice. 

“Whatcha watching, Jack-my-love?” Shitty mumbles from the other bed. 

Jack jumps. “More of Bittle’s videos,” he says.

“He’s a talented guy, huh.”

“Yeah.”

“Some of his early ones,” Shitty says, rolling over; Jack can hear the comforter crinkling a little bit. “Some of those, he put in game footage. In case you were wondering.”

His voice is a little too knowing, a little too smug. Jack flushes. He clears his throat. “Thanks,” Jack says. 

Shitty’s snores fill the room within minutes.

Jack scrolls through Bittle’s videos until he finds one dated four years back, settles into his blankets, and presses play.

________________________

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! Lemme know what you think so far :)


	3. Chapter 3

________________________

They don’t win. Jack closes his eyes when the buzzer sounds and exhales, sharp and upset with himself, before trying to shower away the disappointment in the locker room. It’s a rare luxury, showering right after a game like this. Faber shut off the warm water sometime in the middle of last season immediately following one of their midnight practices. Ransom and Holster still talk about suing; they both developed chest colds afterward.

The drive home after away games is either triumphant or quiet or both, a single blend of self-satisfaction that sustains Jack mile by mile. Today’s is a quiet that leaves him so much room to think about passes he mis-timed or shots he could’ve taken if he’d been half a second faster, like that one in the second period when that defenseman checked him or the other when—

“You’re doing it again,” Lardo says softly. He glances at her; she’s curled up in the passenger seat with a giant fluffy blanket pulled all the way up to her chin. A quick look in the rearview mirror reveals the others are in a similar position. He hadn’t realized Holster was snoring.

He says, “Trying not to,” and she eases a hand out from underneath the blanket so she can rest it on his elbow. He breathes around the touch.

It strikes him all at once, how lucky he is to be so easily understood. He says. Lardo smiles at him.

“We got your back,” she says, tapping her knuckles against his arm. “Always here for you, bro.”

____________

They drop off Lardo at her apartment and then Jack parks neatly in the overgrown lot behind the Haus, backing up so the trunk is closest to the back door. They unload without talking too much. Jack yawns and immediately Shitty yawns too. It’s at least 11 PM. 

“Thanks for driving, brah,” Shitty says sleepily in the basement while they hang their gear to dry. Jack just nods, hiding another yawn in his hand. Shitty isn’t waiting for an answer anyway; he knows Jack too well to expect a response to  _ thank yous. _ He’s never been good at them.

His room is too many stairs away. On the main floor, Jack stops to fill up a cup of water from the tap and washes his water bottle methodically, first rolling up his shirtsleeves, then unbuttoning the shirt completely. The kitchen feels oddly silent. They haven’t done a whole lot of baking in here since the video, and he thinks the room might be slightly resentful at the inattention. It could just be his sleep deprivation talking, and yet. It has the same sort of gloom he’s feeling after losing.

It’s late and this is a horrible idea. He scrolls through Bittle’s blog anyway.

He scans the recipe again, muttering to himself while he looks for flour and brown sugar. A quick peek in the fridge yields enough eggs for what he’s trying to do, but definitely not enough for a big breakfast tomorrow; he apologizes to the fridge for Holster’s boiled egg habit. 

He piles everything into a mixing bowl and whisks until he thinks his forearm’s about to fall off. Without the stress of being on camera, Jack opens the chocolate chip packaging easily. It’s … strange, almost, how peaceful this is. Being in the semi-dark with baking ingredients all around him. Making something. The third period slips out of his mind, chased by the difference between convect and bake and whether or not Dex ever managed to fix the oven dials. Soon enough the cookies are on trays on the center rack. He sets a timer, thinking.

They’ll have to get on a proper schedule if they want this to work. Even with Lardo’s art show, there has to be a way for them to find cameras, and even the simplest editing program would be useful. Maybe he’ll make Nursey show him how to use iMovie. Nursey has a strong vibe of someone who has a secret YouTube channel. And maybe they can film some of their practices to make sure people know who they are and what they can do outside of fucking up baking recipes. 

The timer goes off. Jack slides on an oven mitt and pulls the tray out, enveloped by a gust of warm, heavenly air. He breathes in deep and imagines, maybe, the smell made the kitchen brighten up a little. He thinks maybe there’s some golden light stuck in the corners. He thinks, probably, that’s definitely his sleep deprivation talking. He bites into one and even he can tell he left them in a little too long, but it’s edible. Part of him isn’t sure if it would matter if it  _ wasn’t _ edible; there’s a small thrill running up his back at the idea of having made something. 

Jack takes a selfie holding the tray. It comes out a little blurry and a whole lot squinty, but it’ll do. He posts it with this caption:

**@smhockey - 30 secs ago**

Late night cookies do a lot to cheer us up after a tough loss. Thanks for the recipe,  **@omgcheckplease** ! #SamwellMensHockey #EatYourHeartOut

He snags another cookie before putting them away. 

____________

_ Bzzt. Bzzt. Bzzt. _

Jack slaps at his alarm clock without opening his eyes. The noise continues. He glares in the direction of his nightstand, trying his best not to let too much light in. And frowns. It’s 6:42 AM. His alarm doesn’t go off until 7:30, which means—

His door slams open and Jack almost falls out of bed. “Jack you motherfucker,” Shitty shouts, jumping on top of him, “you beautiful bastard, you absolutely gorgeous jerk, you fucker—”

“Get  _ off _ of me, Shitty what the  _ fuck—” _

Jack sits up, heart going a million miles a minute. Shitty gently rolls to the side while uttering profanity in a long-winded stream, and Jack is now awake enough to be more concerned than pissed off. Shitty’s wearing pajama pants. If that’s not a sign of the world ending, Jack doesn’t know what is.

“What happened?” he asks, hugging a pillow close. 

“You did,” Shitty says simply. 

He waves his phone in Jack’s face and Jack snatches it to read:  _ Retweeted by @omgcheckplease — “Late night cookies….” _ Jack reads it again. And then again. After the fourth time, he looks at Shitty.

“Does this — he saw it,” Jack says slowly. “He definitely saw it. Right?”

Shitty slides his phone open and taps over to Twitter. “He definitely saw it,” he confirms. “And he quote tweeted it, like, right after. Look…”

**@omgcheckplease✓ — 6 hours ago**

Those look slightly too well done, but otherwise great! Sorry about your game, but good to know hockey & baking get along there. I actually almost played for Samwell :-) 

Jack says, feeling numb, “He would’ve been on our team,” and Shitty nods so much he’s in real danger of hitting his head on the wall. “Wait. Shitty he would’ve played  _ with us _ do you think — if we asked him, would he visit?”

He tells himself he brought up a visit because of the obvious hockey connection, not because of anything else. Holy  _ fuck. _ The fact of this, that this beautiful man almost shared the ice with him, is enough to make his face so warm he’s positive he’s blushing. Shitty hadn’t turned on the light when he came in, which made his entrance more than a little terrifying, but at least the light from their shared bathroom isn’t enough to prove how red his cheeks are.

“That might be too soon, Jackybabe, but I’m loving the enthusiasm.” Shitty snags one of Jack’s pillows and cuddles it. “I’m thinking we outta reply to his comment, maybe say ‘wow that’s wild, maybe we would’ve been linemates’ or just like. Ask him if he has any tips for baking with finicky ovens, right? Keep it related?”

“Makes sense,” Jack says. He reaches for his phone and sees a few dozen people liked and retweeted both this post and the video Lardo put out, which explains the buzzing that woke him up. 

Carefully, he types,  _ Hockey world is small haha :-) Do you have any advice re: convect versus bake? Our oven likes to act up. _ With Shitty’s blessing, he hits post.

Then he pauses. “I didn’t think he’d see it, do you think — it was midnight, so. Do I, euh.” 

He can’t really see Shitty’s face, but the shadowy blob where Shitty’s face would be is perceptibly smug. “Are you asking me if you look okay?”

“No, I mean,” he protests. Shitty’s laughing so much he’s shaking the bed, but at least he’s doing his best to pretend to have a coughing fit. “Shut up, I meant is this a good picture for us to have out on the internet, I don’t know if it should’ve been — Chowder and Holster, right, it’s their idea, it should’ve been them?”

“You look hot in a domestic kind of way,” Shitty says through his fake coughs. He clears his throat. “In that way that says, yes, I’m a provider, but also I’ll give it to you  _ good _ if you want me to, you know?”

“You have no idea how much I wish you hadn’t been in my bed while saying that,” Jack mutters. Shitty just snickers.

____________

**smh groupchat**

_ Holster: _ the unbuttoned shirt was a good move Jack

_ Ransom: _ Next time we gotta get the ASSets on display too

_ Holster: _ maybe balance the tray on your butt next time?

_ Ransom: _ Haha get it

_ Lardo: _ yes. we get it

_ Ransom: _ bc ASS

_ Chowder: _ Farmer says the unbuttoned shirt >>> balancing on the ass

_ Chowder: _ Ass pics are too obvious

_ Shitty: _ and we are nothing if not classy bitches

_ Lardo: _ retweet

_ Jack:  _ I hate all of you.

_ (Jack Zimmermann has left the chat.) _

_ (Shitty added Jack Zimmermann to the chat!) _

_ Holster: _ aw baby don’t be like that

_ Jack: _ :/

_ (Jack Zimmermann has left the chat.) _

_ (Shitty added Jack Zimmermann to the chat!) _

_ Jack: _ Shitty let me put myself out of my misery

_ Shitty: _ absolutely not.

_ Shitty: _ your ass is stuck with ours

_ Shitty: _ nice try

____________

Bittle DMs the team account a few days after Jack’s post. His phone buzzes during Atley’s explanation of pioneer exploitation and he sneaks it out just enough to read  _ @omgcheckplease✓ — “Hi! Just figured it’d be easier to talk over DMs than…”  _ and  _ “the cookies! I meant…” _ before Atley clears her throat pointedly. Jack slides his phone away, mouthing  _ sorry _ and wincing. She nods in acknowledgement before continuing with her lecture.

He’s never had a harder time concentrating during a class, including the few times he straight up fell asleep. He does his best to pay attention for notes but eventually just gives up, instead doodling various combinations of cookies, muffins, cakes, and pies in the margins of his notebook. When Atley dismisses them, he shoves his things into his backpack and takes off, mentally preparing a list of nonchalant responses. Then he realizes there’s literally no point to that because he can’t see all of what Bittle wrote. 

Jack bites his lip, thumb hovering over the notification. There’s no way he should feel this nervous about opening this. 

He texts Chowder instead.

_ Jack: _ Hey! So Bittle sent us a DM

_ Jack: _ Do you have any ideas for responses

_ Chowder: _ !!!!

_ Chowder: _ That’s so cool!!

_ Chowder: _ I’ll come over after my last class I’m sure we can think of something!!!

____________

“What’d he say?” Chowder asks through a mouthful of cookies. 

Ransom says, “He’s asking Jack out,” and Jack frowns and slides the cookies out of his reach. Ransom frowns. “That’s cold, man.”

Lardo and Holster reach into the tupperware at the same time and hand both cookies to Ransom, who stacks them and eats them both in three crumb-scattering bites. It’s both impressive and vaguely nauseating.

“You don’t all have to be here for this,” Jack says. “I can figure it out. If you’ve got other things to do.”

Lardo says, “Literally there’s nothing going on right now,” and Shitty adds, “It’s a Thursday, practice isn’t until later and this is so much better than anything on TV right now.”

Jack grimaces. He opens the message.

** _@omgcheckplease✓:_ ** Hi! Just figured it’d be easier to talk over DMs than clogging up your feed with replies! The main difference is just that convection ovens have more even heat, because there’s a fan circulating the air. Regular bake doesn’t have that, so cookies can come out closer to what you have than a true golden brown. Doesn’t mean they’re bad! It’s a good picture, very yummy ^-^

** _@omgcheckplease✓: _ ** the cookies! I meant the cookies look really tasty, you did a great job

“‘Very yummy,’ huh?” Shitty says. Jack flips him off under the table. Shitty winks at him.

“They’re not bad,” Lardo says. “Lots of love in this, I will say.”

Holster says, “Ah, yes. That’s why they’re so dry,” and Chowder nearly chokes on his cookie.

After Chowder’s breathing has settled, he asks for the phone. Jack complies in order to silence the butterflies fluttering against his ribs. Ransom and Holster whisper back and forth about whether or not Bittle meant Jack was yummy, and Shitty loudly asks if they’ve ever seen Jack before, and this time Jack flips them off with both hands. Lardo lends one of hers so they can cover all three of them.

“We could just say ‘that makes sense, thanks,’” Chowder says. He hands the phone back Jack tries to hold it normally and not like he’s just been handed something precious. “Unless someone has another baking question?”

Shitty says, “We need something to keep him interested.” Jack’s nodding in agreement until Shitty adds, “For Jackybaby’s sake.” 

“Chowder’s right,” Jack says. “It’s got to stay professional.”

“Or, here—” Lardo snags the phone and reads as she types. “‘That makes sense, thanks! I was wondering, if it isn’t too personal, why didn’t you come to Samwell? We could’ve used your baking skills in the Haus.’ How’s that?”

“I don’t know,” Jack starts, but Holster interrupts.

“It’s perfect.”

Lardo hits send.

Jack takes a deep, deep breath.

____________

Hall puts them through their paces during practice. They always do at least twenty minutes of power skating after a loss, but today it’s upped to thirty-five; Hall is of the opinion that if you can skate and skate hard, fast, and well, then it almost doesn’t matter if your stick handling isn’t perfect, that the biggest victories come when you can outskate your opponents. Holster and Shitty have taken to calling him Herb Brooks after these practices. Then they cycle through another forty-five minutes of passing and shooting drills, until finally they play 3-on-3 for the last ten minutes of practice.

“Okay, men,” Hall says at the end, when they’re all exhausted and lying on center ice. The coolness seeps through Jack’s jersey and pads in the best possible way. Out of the corner of his eye, he spots Hall skating through to a stop at the middle of the circle. 

He continues, “Good practice tonight. I’m seeing some good improvement out there, it took longer to wear you all out than it did at the beginning of preseason, and that’s really all I can ask for right now. Go home and rest up. We’ve got our home opener tomorrow night, and you all need fresh legs.”

“That was a lot,” Shitty comments in the locker room.

Jack hums in agreement, flicking his gloves into his bag and checking his phone. No messages. He tries not to be too disappointed. It’s early days, and Bittle’s a celebrity — he probably gets DMs all the time. And maybe there’s a time difference too, wherever he is. 

“He’ll reply,” Shitty says, gently throwing a ball of tape at Jack’s leg. Jack catches it without thinking. “I think he likes us.”

Jack says, “Not sure about ‘us,’” and Shitty rolls his eyes fondly. “Didn’t realize he called all of us yummy.”

“Yeah, well. I could’ve taken an unbuttoned sexy picture too.”

Jack tosses the tap ball back and undoes his skates. “But you didn’t.”

“But I would’ve done it on purpose, is the thing.” Shitty lobs the ball into Jack’s bag. Jack’s too lazy to fish it out. His elbow pads and jersey follow shortly after. “You did it on accident.”

“Maybe.”

“‘Maybe’ my ass, Zimmermann,” Shitty says.

Jack says, “But I thought you were a classy bitch,” and Dex, Holster, and Nursey all stifle laughter. 

Shitty shakes his head grudgingly. “Never should’ve taught you to chirp.”

“Nah, that was all my dad,” Jack says, and they head home.

____________ ____________

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh my god I'm so sorry this took so long :| school & personal ish has been a LOT but better late than never, yeah?  
Lemme know what you think below, or [come find me on tumblr :)](https://ivecarvedawoodenheart.tumblr.com/)


	4. Chapter 4

________________________

Jack’s thought about asking his uncles for help. After the draft, when the first medical bills hit and they were so much more than any of them expected, Bad Bob had spent many mornings and afternoons on the phone with his NHL buddies, trying to ask for money without making it so obvious he was asking for money. They all heard it clear enough.

It’s a delicate dance no one in his family had had to do before, at least not in a very long time. Uncle Mario and Uncle Wayne were more than willing to help out, but after asking for money to save your life, asking to save a college hockey team seems insignificant. 

Maybe it’s a pride thing. No, it’s almost definitely a pride thing; he wants to show them he can do this, if not on his own than not in such a way that burdens them. Objectively it wouldn’t be too much of a bother, but he can’t imagine asking. He’s a Zimmermann. They’re not good at asking for help like that.

In the locker room, he asks Shitty to borrow some tape while ignoring the peeling paint flaking off the walls. He breaks a lace tying his skates and Lardo, alerted by some managerial sixth sense or just Ransom hollering to see if anyone has a spare, opens the door with her eyes closed and still manages to beam Jack in the ear with the replacement. Dex and Nursey and the other frogs laugh. He balls up his broken lace and tosses it at Nursey, because he was laughing the loudest, and tells himself it’s okay to ask for help in these small ways. They’re a team. He’d do all of these things for them, and has, and will again. 

“You got your thinking eyebrows going,” Shitty comments, tapping Jack’s knee with his own. “What’s happening behind that pretty face?”

He says, “It just hit me that this is my last first home game,” and Shitty groans and body slams into him. 

Jack mumbles something about his pregame rituals not involving this, and Shitty mumbles something back about “they do now, better get used to it babe,” and this pressure on his back — this familiar thing he and Shitty have done over the last four years of knowing each other — this is grounding.

“I didn’t think you heard me,” Jack says now. It doesn’t make much sense out of the context of his train of thought, but Shitty pats his cheek anyway.

“I always hear you,” Shitty says. Jack holds onto him tighter.

____________

The first period is brutal and even Jack, who doesn’t get many penalties — not for lack of effort on the other team; everyone wants a piece of Bad Bob’s son — spends his two minutes in the box on a bullshit roughing call. The second period is worse. Harvard brought some of their student section along for the ride, and while Samwell’s stands aren’t full, there’s still plenty of Wellies around to chirp the other fans. The energy’s spilling into the game easily as anything Jack’s ever seen. There’s a clump of Harvard students clustered around Chowder’s net in both periods, and as they take the ice for the third, Jack pulls Chowder aside.

“Don’t worry about them, okay?” Jack says, glaring down the rink at a guy behind the home net. The fan pounds on the glass and flips him off in response. 

Chowder uses his waterbottle to spray his face. “It’s hard to tune them out. Later in the season I might be fine, but starting off with this—”

Jack had forgotten this was only his second college game. “You’re doing good,” he says, and Chowder seems to mentally shake himself. “It’s still a zero-zero game, Chowder, that save you had in the first? That huge diving one? You’re playing really well. Leave everyone else to us.”

He wins the faceoff. With his team next to him, Jack takes every hit the other team levels, leaving them sore with well-aimed and well-timed elbows to the ribs in retaliation. Holster and Ransom keep them set up in the zone. Chowder keeps it locked down in their defensive zone. 

There’s enough time, there should be—

He checks the clock.

There’s still five minutes left the game, they have possession, they have this—

“Hey!” Stick taps, loud and insistent. Ransom passes. An easy _ thwack _ against the tape of Jack’s stick.

Jack can feel his breath scraping the back of his throat, skates cutting deeper into the ice, the other net looming larger second by second— 

A large shadow on his right. Jack keeps his focus on the net and shoots and, in the seconds between being on the ice and being airborne, he sees it go in.

____________

Lardo tells him afterward how beautiful a goal it was while holding ice to the back of his head with her left hand and writing up an accident report with her right.

“I’m fine, the trainer said I’m good,” Jack keeps saying, and he _ is, _ his head hurts but barely, but every time he tries to sit up she lets a little more melted water drip down the back of his neck. He slaps at it.

“I know,” she says now. He makes note of how, apparently, it takes thirteen protestations to get a response from her. “I just. I worry. It was a big hit.”

Now that she says it Jack notices how tightly she’s holding the pen. He lies back down. His head _ does _ hurt, in all fairness. Even if just a little. And it _ was _ a big hit. 

“Well. I’ve been eating protein,” Jack says weakly. 

She rolls her eyes affectionately. “Thank the heavens for that.” 

The trainer comes by a few minutes later to collect the paperwork, take Jack’s vitals, and release him into Shitty’s anxious hands. Jack lets the two of them bundle him into Shitty’s car, listening to Lardo give Shitty shit for making her carry Jack’s bag.

“It’s as big as I am — bigger, actually, and I have to—”

“I have my own shit and you’re the strongest motherfucker I know—”

“Yeah but there’s still a strength-to-height ratio, Shitty, and it reeks—”

“You keep saying you can pick all of us up,” Jack says, once they’re preoccupied with buckling to keep bickering.

Lardo punches him lightly on the arm. “And I _ can, _ Zimmermann. I fucking can. I’m just saying your bag smells like ass and I don’t wanna bleach my nostrils to get it out of my system.”

“If you can wait until we get back,” Jack says, “I’m thinking of making more cookies.”

He says it without thinking, but it makes sense once he examines the impulse. It’s reassuring and it tastes good and it’ll make the whole place smell so much better than hockey stink and that’s it, those are the only reasons. 

He doesn’t like the way Shitty and Lardo glance at each other in the mirror. He presents his rationale, but now they’re arching their eyebrows.

“What,” Jack says finally. 

Shitty eases them into a nearly perfect parallel park in front of the Haus. “Didn’t say anything, honey bun.”

“Your eyebrows did.”

“His face is always talking shit,” Lardo says. He thinks her face is maybe a little bit pink, but it’s hard to tell in the light. 

Jack thinks about this for a few breaths. “I’m not saving you any,” he says, yanking his bag out of the trunk. He sniffs it cautiously and has to fight to keep a neutral expression. 

Lardo says, “I told you,” and he makes a face.

He’s halfway through the door when Shitty calls, “Tell Bittle hi from us, yeah?”

Jack ignores him, but the back of his neck could probably heat a small oven. 

____________

Bittle doesn’t interact with Jack’s snickerdoodle cookies tweet, but a few baking themed Twitters follow the team account over the next few days. One random day near the end of his food class Jack goes to checks if Bittle even opened the last message before stopping himself, reminding himself that it’s not the end of the world and also it’s no reflection on himself as a person and also maybe it’s just Bittle is busy or possibly even that—

“Jack?” Professor Atley says. The way she’s forming his name makes it seem like she’s been saying it for awhile.

He jumps and drops his phone. His neighbor, a girl with tortoise-shell glasses, hands it back to him before she stands and leaves the room. “Yeah?”

“I wanted to ask you about the team,” Atley says. “Coach Hall forwarded me some of your Twitter pictures and videos from the last few weeks. I wanted to offer my help, if it would be useful.”

He doesn’t know what to say. After starting and restarting and stammering something like “yes, please, we have no idea what the fuck we’re doing” except minus the swearing, Jack fills Atley in on their ideas and how they’re raising money (they aren’t) and who’s been baking (he is; everyone else is busy and doesn’t like being up early) and whether or not they’ve gotten any donations yet (no, but they have a GoFundMe pinned to their Twitter profile). 

Atley nods and gently nudges him along when he’s stuck forming a sentence. At the end, she says, “We have kitchens in this building that are available, if you’re unsure of the quality of your oven. The cost of stocking the pantry is included in your tuition money as part of the drive to end hunger on campus. And I’m sure the baking club would be interested in partnering with you for some sort of bake sale.”

This is — wow. This could change everything.

“Are you serious?” Jack says. 

Atley smiles. “I can’t promise it’ll work out,” she says, “but it’s an idea.”

She gives him contact information for the president of the baking club — someone named Camilla, who Jack vaguely recognizes as a name associated with tennis or volleyball — and prints out a map to the basement kitchens. Jack takes a picture of the map so he doesn’t lose it before sliding it into his backpack.

“Thank you,” he says. There is little else to say. He’s still reeling.

“Of course,” she says. “Feel free to email if you have questions.”

____________

“Oh fuck me,” Ransom says in the doorway. Holster mutters “Maybe later” under his breath. Jack can’t say he blames either of them.

The student kitchens are a lot larger than Jack thought they’d be. There are four ovens in the whole room, each set up neatly in the corners alongside a refrigerator, a sink, and countertops for days. Shitty and Dex immediately start going through the drawers while Jack spins on his heels, taking it all in. It’s painted a warm buttery-yellow that makes him immediately think of Bittle. He pauses, doing his best to redirect the association. 

“This is extremely chill,” Nursey says, and the resulting Nursey-Dex argument over whether or not a kitchen can be “chill” is enough of a distraction that the idea of Bittle slips away.

“Listen up, people,” Lardo says. Everyone shuts up as she plonks a tripod onto an unused table and sets up the camera. She glances around. “I don’t have anything to say, I didn’t actually think that would work.”

Shitty clears his throat. “So today’s the same sort of idea as last time,” he says. “Except without Holster judging, because his mom told me he makes damn good lemon bars at the last parents weekend and I fucking want some.”

Holster looks pained. “It’s your own family,” he says. Chowder laughs.

Shitty ignores him. “Jack and I are judging, Lardo’s on camera, frogs and Rans and Holtzy, you’re baking. _ But wait, _ you might be saying to yourself. _ Shitty, that’s a shitton of people to be baking at once. _ Never fear, dearest ones, you’ll be in teams.”

Ransom and Holster do a complicated handshake that completely baffles Jack’s eyes. When they finish, he has to stifle a laugh at the resigned, preemptively stressed, and optimistic expressions on Nursey’s, Dex’s, and Chowder’s faces, respectively. 

Lardo cues them to start a few breaths later. Jack, taking Shitty’s lead, goes between the groups to alternatingly encourage and chirp them as the situation warrants. The frogs decided on a cheesecake before Dex reminded them none of them know how to make a cheesecake, then switched to pies before Nursey said the same thing, and finally end up doing cake pops with a recipe Jack sent to Chowder after the cheesecake conversation. Chowder mouths a _ thank you _. Jack nods. 

Ransom and Holster have the filling for their lemon bars done before the five minute mark. 

“Rans, can you swirl my dough?”

“Oh you know I can swirl your dough, Holtzy.”

“You always get it nice and thick bro, you’re the best swirler this side of the Mississippi.”

_ “Bro.” _

Jack says, “Please don’t swirl this close to the food,” and Ransom says, “Don’t kink shame us, Zimmermann.” Jack chokes on a laugh.

“Friendly reminder this is supposed to be G-rated,” Lardo comments, smirking.

“Yeah, Jack, watch yourself,” Shitty says. Jack makes a face at him.

It’s so much easier being on this side of things, he thinks. So much less stressful watching them try things without the pressure of being on camera. His team. He watches the frogs argue over whether or not to freeze the cake pops and overheards Ransom and Holster flirting and hugs Shitty from behind, hooking his chin on top of his head. Shitty awkwardly pats Jack on the cheek. 

“You good?” Shitty asks.

Out of the corner of his eye he sees Lardo pan the camera over to them, going slow in order not to startle them. Jack winks at the lens. She smiles behind it.

“They’re funny,” Jack says simply. “It’s a good day.”

____________

Ransom’s and Holster’s lemon bars win by virtue of being edible and also good, because while the frogs’ cake pops are technically edible, they’re at once too goopy and too frozen to consume. 

“Surprised you got this done with all the flirting that was happening,” Jack says with his mouth full.

Holster goes bright red. “No idea what you mean. You sure that check didn’t mess with your head?”

“Yeah, did Bittle respond?” Ransom says, clearly trying to keep his voice normal. “You meant all the flirting that was happening with your Twitter crush, right?”

“Swear I saw hearts flying out of your eyes.”

“And like, Cupid or some shit shooting you in the ass.”

“And your boner—”

“Okay,” Jack says loudly. 

Lardo pshaws. “Just trying to get out of fines,” she says, shaking her head. “Disrespectful, boys.”

Ransom narrows his eyes. “What about the time you straight up said you loved Shitty—”

Jack whispers, “Sorry, can’t help you out of that one,” making to leave, and Lardo wipes her crumbs on his shirt. He heads over to the frogs while Shitty launches into a spiel on mustache care, effectively drowning Ransom out.

____________

Lardo tweets out their video and this time they start getting some big name recognition. Jack had mentioned something about it in passing to his mom after the video, who must’ve told his dad, and the two of them must have said something to their famous friends because all of a sudden the team’s retweets is a flurry of blue checkmarks that generate hundreds of likes. Some of them retweet the GoFundMe link too, and, very slowly, the bar inches closer toward being filled. His mom heard him asking for help. Jack closes Twitter feeling lighter. 

Four days after the video, Jack’s phone buzzes while he’s driving the Zamboni after another late night practice. It’s probably just the groupchat, he tells himself, fighting down a horde of butterflies. It’s become sort of ridiculous how much he wants Bittle to respond to their DM. It’s been this mess of emotions almost every time his phone goes off. It had been getting better lately, but it’s something about the late hour that brings those sorts of feelings back up.

His phone buzzes two more times as he’s driving off the ice. After putting everything back in its place, Jack checks it.

** _@omgcheckplease✓:_ ** OMG I’m so sorry, I’m touring for my new book and the schedule’s crazy hectic! Didn’t mean to leave you hanging there. But as for your question about Samwell, that’s sort of personal. I’d be a lot more comfortable talking about it over the phone, if that’s okay? Screenshots get everywhere

** _@omgcheckplease✓:_ ** Not that I think you’d screenshot anything. But better to be careful

** _@omgcheckplease✓: _ **Here’s my number

They’re the most beautiful ten numbers Jack’s ever seen.

And he knows they don’t know each other and it’s late, or just very early — the air feels deep the way it always is when it’s after midnight — but Bittle’s messages are timestamped three minutes ago, and he’s tired in that way you get when you stop being sleepy and start being bold, so— 

Jack calls him.

________________________

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _But Sydney,_ you may be saying to yourself. _They're talking? On the phone? That's one hell of a cliffhanger isn't it?_  
You would ask that. 
> 
> Aaaaa I can't believe this thing is 10k goodness  
Thanks for all the comments so far!! I really appreciate them, they really do add fuel to my writerly fire :)  
lemme know what you think below!

**Author's Note:**

> This comes from shitty-check-please-aus at some point, I'll have to track down the link  
Thanks for reading this so far! I'm trying to get this all mostly written soon, within the next 1-2 months :)  
Lemme know what you think here or [come find me on Tumblr! :)](https://ivecarvedawoodenheart.tumblr.com)


End file.
